Crushing defeat was merely one frustration in a pig of a week for Michael Vaughan. The South Africa bowlers again exposed his defence and their coach sought to undermine him with dining-room tittle-tattle. Television replays ruled out a (probably) legitimate catch and finally, as captain and front man, he was left to explain the most extraordinary piece of selection by England in decades.

Vaughan had claimed that the team changes were “confused” and had unsettled the players. His views struck a nerve with Geoff Miller, the national selector, who said yesterday: “I need to know exactly what was said and clarify why he said it. If there has been an issue in the dressing-room, I need to find out where we stand.”

The England captain is well and truly beleaguered. Between now and the third npower Test at Edgbaston beginning a week today he needs to sort out his footwork and restore confidence at the crease. He must ignore the injustice of his cancelled catch of Hashim Amla being bracketed with a far more dubious claim by A. B. de Villiers in the debate over technology and forget that Mickey Arthur chose to publicise his tirade during the lunch break at De Villiers.

Vaughan is furious with the South Africa coach for what he viewed as deliberate muck-raking. Once the incident was in the public domain, De Villiers could reply to the inevitable questions by agreeing that it served to motivate him towards his 174. Like all teams, South Africa are targeting the opposition captain. And their blows are landing.

Vaughan will also bristle at being the focus of criticism over the choice of Darren Pattinson. Miller and James Whitaker are the members of the selection panel who travel the counties monitoring the form of potential England candidates. Having watched Pattinson over the past three months, they thought he would be a better bet than Matthew Hoggard and others.

The England captain has an input, of course, but he could hardly argue about a bowler he had not seen. While Vaughan has the final say on the morning of a game, he chooses only from the squad already picked. He asked for somebody who would pitch the ball up and swing it, and those supposedly in the know said that Pattinson was the man. To judge from the brevity of Pattinson’s first three-over spell, Vaughan was unconvinced.

In fact, as Peter Moores, the head coach, said, Pattinson made a reasonable debut overall. He went for roughly three runs per over and took a couple of good wickets in Amla, albeit with some umpiring help, and Ashwell Prince. He shaped the ball away and would no doubt have been more successful had the South Africans shown the same indiscipline as the England batsmen by pushing at balls outside their off stump.

Unfortunately, erasing the unflattering image of a 29-year-old Australian roof tiler who was playing club cricket two years ago required something beyond Pattinson’s powers. If he was the same age as Stuart Broad, 22, whom he outbowled, learnt the game in his birthplace of Grimsby and had spent a winter at the National Academy, his performance might be viewed through a different prism, as the beginning rather than the end.

But it all looks very odd. England clearly have no confidence in Chris Tremlett. All very well to say that he was not the horse for the course, but why, then, was he rather than Pattinson the original replacement for Ryan Sidebottom? And if, as Vaughan claimed, England always intended to play five bowlers, why was Paul Collingwood still around the squad an hour before the start for his disappointment to cast a pall?

If an outsider so upsets the balance of the dressing-room, then it sounds like a closed shop. Pattinson cannot be blamed for the Headingley debacle. The batsmen can, Vaughan included.